With the advent of the Internet and its ease of use to research and book travel, travel agencies had to change their model to successfully compete. In a traditional setting, customers would visit retail storefront or “brick and mortar” travel agency locations and make travel plans while looking at brochures and sitting face-to-face with a travel agent. As the Internet became more and more prevalent in the travel industry, storefront locations began closing and many travel agents were faced with a choice—find a new career or open their own home based travel agency. Many home based travel agents own and operate their own business and use a host agency that may provide benefits such as higher commission levels from suppliers, support and technology.
Some host agencies and others in the travel industry have attempted to send leads out to one or more travel agents as part of a large email blast along with details of the customer lead and contact information. Once an email is received, one or more travel agents contact the customer directly and then the customer selects the “best offer”. Agents are often charged per lead or share in the commission. Another prior method comprises sending out a mass Instant Message to a large pool of agents, wherein the first to respond gets the lead or simply transferring customer leads by phone common ACD phone systems and typical distribution methods such as longest available or round-robin. A disadvantage of all of these methods used to distribute leads is that none determine and distribute based on which particular agent or agents are most likely to close not just the current lead with high levels of customer service but will also create additional and ongoing sales from these leads thru returning customers and referrals thereby optimizing the ROI for both the selling agent and the company providing the leads.